Zoos Do Battle In Cute Animal 'Tweet Off' And The Internet's Loving It

A bunch of zoos from around the country engaged in a cute animal battle on Twitter

On Friday, while most of us were freaking out about the frightening news spreading across our social media feeds, a handful of zoos and aquariums provided the perfect distraction by competing the share the cutest animal pictures they could find.

Thank God for small miracles. And animals.

According to Bored Panda, the whole thing started when Sarah Hill, a user from Virginia, challenged the VA Aquarium to top the Smithsonian National Zoo’s picture of a grey seal pup.

Before you could say “challenge accepted,” the Virginia Aquarium accepted Sarah’s challenge, and the game was on.

The tweets were hashtagged with both “#cuteanimaltweetoff” and “#challengeaccepted” and it wasn’t long before other zoos and aquariums joined the fun. When the Bronx Zoo entered the fray, they tagged a handful of other zoos, and soon it was an all-out cute animal melee! Among the facilities that participated were the Queens Zoo, the Tulsa Zoo, the Denver Zoo, the Columbus Zoo, and plenty more.

Even the Tokyo Zoo got in on the cute animal action!

One of the staples of social media is images and videos of cute animals, and at the end of a week which had no shortage of bad news, it was a total relief to watch the cavalcade of adorable animals tumble down your Twitter feed.

There were otters and owls and apes and pandas and deer and sloths and countless more, and every pic seemed somehow cuter than the last. We’re partial to big cats, so we’ll leave you with one last pic. Hopefully, this will help you get through the weekend.